Читать книгу Any Means Necessary - Shane Britten - Страница 8

The conference venue was a straightforward business hotel called Four Points, a ten-minute walk from my hotel. This distance was short enough to make a foot surveillance detection route, also known as counter-surveillance, challenging. The tradecraft felt good; I’d always enjoyed studying local streets to identify choke points and the other elements that could be combined as the basic foundation of surveillance detection. The goal was to create a pathway between locations that took you through enough choke points to identify if someone was following you without them noticing you were doing that. Simple, in theory at least. Done properly, it was a way to identify surveillance without revealing your tradecraft knowledge.

Once I’d studied it on Google Maps and Street View, I spent most of my first full day on the ground to refresh my area familiarisation, given just how long it had been since I’d spent time in Brisbane. After a few hours, I felt comfortable enough to operate with relative security. It wasn’t perfect, but a bit of fundamental tradecraft paired with experience would see me through.

The short distance between Four Points and the Treasury Casino included the Queen Street Mall, the main shopping area of Brisbane City. That created fantastic opportunities for some of the aspects of an effective counter-surveillance run, including quick turns (where a surveillance team needed to be close to you as there were several exits or egress points after a quick, blind corner or they would be in danger of losing you if they weren’t close by), mirrored returns (where a straight line walk provided a mirrored surface in front to give you a solid look at who was approaching behind without Hollywood theatrics like pausing at a mirror shop), switchbacks (where following a natural pathway had you turning back on yourself, most commonly found in escalators or travelators that turned back on themselves to go up levels, giving you a reason to look back at people behind you) and areas of varying occupancy to vary the depth a surveillance team would need to operate within. This created transitions, where a surveillance team would need to be close to you at certain times and further back at others, all of which created opportunities for confusion, mixed communication and hence identifying your pursuers.

It wasn’t that I expected surveillance associated with the conference. But it was better to be prepared than caught unawares.

Once I was satisfied with five separate planned routes and enough additional features that I could create a counter-surveillance route on the fly if need be, I moved towards the venue. It was in a fairly quiet street away from the centre of the CBD, with cafes and restaurants at one end, a few multi-storey parking structures opposite the hotel itself, and a stretch with office space running down towards the Brisbane River.

I spent some time over the next day with my laptop at a small café called Cheddar that offered an uninterrupted view of the Four Points Hotel from a safe distance. Most laptops had a small webcam above the monitor and mine was no different, though it was covered with a security tab. Mine was also equipped with a disguised camera on the lid of the laptop, facing the same way I was. The clever technical addition meant that as I worked, it captured a live stream of the hotel driveway.

While I was busy with more research on the group that I would be attempting to join, that hidden camera was surveilling my ultimate destination. The camera was high resolution and equipped with video analytics software that automatically grabbed faces and vehicle number plates, sending them back to Philip and Jack for matching.

The waitress brought my first long black of the day and I took a quick sip, determined to make the most of the time before the conference. I needed to better understand WOLF and its motivations, so I started trawling through the internet and a short list of bookmarks Jack had sent me.

Their missive was far from simple. While the group’s underlying message seemed to be anti-globalisation, there appeared to be nationalistic ideals mixed into an odd hybrid with closed-border advocacy that hinted at the use of violent tactics.

There were glossy pictures on a fairly standard webpage of people sitting in groups, laughing and talking. A lot of the publicity was about the group’s leader, Eran Tuso. A self-styled prophet of the new world, Tuso seemed like a typically charismatic figure, linked to a range of legitimate charities and issues over his 50-odd years of life. His credentials and background were vague and appeared to me to be largely smoke and mirrors. Naturally, I disliked him immensely. I wondered whether it was the charities that linked the unlikely pair of Tuso and Edward.

I glanced at the ‘What to expect’ section of the conference information pack. Enlightenment seemed to be the overwhelming achievement. Just what I’d always wanted. I was a little concerned about the potential that this was wasting a lot of time. I had no confirmation that this was actually the group I wanted or that the rebellious lovers would be anywhere near the session. I swallowed my frustration at the assignment, unable to completely dismiss the annoyance at what I saw to be involvement to avoid political embarrassment. If this didn’t work, I had a fall-back plan that was far more tactically focused. There would be an electronic trace of Edward or Jessica somewhere, from a phone, a credit card, a vehicle’s GPS, something. Blanket investigative coverage of every known vector associated with them was bound to find something. Truly going ‘off the grid’ was a near impossibility in the modern age.

So far, my plan of attack was simple. Attend the conference, see what I could find out about WOLF and, if luck reigned supreme, Edward and Jessica might even be in attendance. Slim chance, I knew.

It was remembering Philip’s last words that gave me pause. Any means necessary was our typical rule of engagement, or ROE. But bringing two young adults away from a group that might embarrass their fathers hardly seemed to warrant the use of violence. There was something darker, more sinister about the entire ordeal, and I hated not knowing what that was. It was an itch at the back of my neck that no amount of scratching would remove. I wondered whether Philip knew more about the reasoning behind the assignment than he’d shared.

A few coffees and a light lunch later, and it was time to move on. In truth, I could have stayed longer as I drew very little attention and people avoided the quiet figure with a laptop who was content to order the occasional coffee and some food. But too long on-target before tomorrow and I ran the risk of my presence being seen for what it was by someone who would know.

The conference was due to commence at 0900hrs tomorrow, so I still had some time to work out my story. Cover was fine. I could wear and shed identities with ease after years of covert work. What I wanted to be confident with was a reason, a cause. Something that had driven me into the arms of Tuso and his merry followers. In the intelligence world this was called a pretext – something that initially seemed easy enough but was one of the most difficult skills to master and one that saw more covert operations ruined than any other factor.

A pretext was the story for why you were there. Poor practitioners had stories that were too basic or too complex, or divulged their entire, beautifully crafted story in one long narrative that sounded unnatural and created. A talented practitioner followed the ‘onion’ model of delivery, providing fewer personal details initially, followed by increasingly private or detailed elements of the story when requested or probed by the target. It wouldn’t do to blurt out my entire pretext up front, or they’d know I was lying. But if I could craft a story that was believable and delivered it selectively, I might be able to win enough trust to try to locate the targets. Having gone through my return counter-surveillance route to the Treasury Casino and detecting nothing, I was still preoccupied with my reason when the elevator doors opened on the sixth level of the hotel, my floor. My instinct immediately kicked in and adrenaline started pumping.

Two men in suits were at my door.

They were mid-conversation. To my mind, they had knocked and had no answer and were debating what was next. I took a few steps closer, leaving the elevator and moving within four doors of them. One of the pair had an object mostly obscured in his hand. If it was a gun, I wanted to be closer. Distance meant a lot of time for the person with the weapon to keep trying, including reloading as required, and even a poor marksman could hit someone if they had enough shots. Proximity meant evasion, angles, a chance to grapple and re-direct. It took confidence though, to approach someone with a firearm. Or stupidity. I wasn’t sure which was dominant in me.

A few more steps and I was within three yards. Only then did they notice or sense my presence. I could see now that it was a room key card the taller, older one held. The survival part of my brain relaxed but the analytical part went into overdrive. Law enforcement was the most logical answer, as they could get a key to my room from the hotel front desk with little worry. Warrants were a strict requirement but the reality of the modern world was that most hotels would offer assistance first and worry about legality second. After all, who wanted to be the hotel keeper who harboured a fugitive or dangerous criminal?

But neither of the individuals wore the Kevlar-strengthened belt of most plain -clothes cops, an important ingredient for carrying a weapon, radio and other standard issue equipment. They also didn’t have the stiff, upright demeanour of cops. And one of them was young, lucky to be much past 22 or 23 to my eye. His aggressive stance and failure to assess my close proximity as a threat stank of arrogance or ignorance and that meant one conclusion – ASIO. As I thought about the head of security at the hotel, it was the only conclusion that made enough sense. Even an experienced former military head of security would acquiesce to ASIO’s demands and be too concerned about electronic monitoring to give me a heads up on their presence.

But in the broader scheme of the situation, it made no sense. Why would the spy agency be here? It was terrible for my cover. Surely James would have shut down any further investigation into the matter, with my involvement.

‘Valentine Tyler?’ the kid asked with a note of superiority to which he had no right.

I suppressed the urge to grimace at the use of my full name. It would be hard to find it on a document now, having done my best to erase my birthright. Before she died, my mother would say with her usual fondness for oversharing that I was conceived on Valentine’s Day and it was therefore her favourite day of the year. It was only fitting that she named me after it. Valentine became Valen pretty quickly after she shared that story in my mid-teens. She had encouraged me to shorten it to Val if I was going to at all, but I was concerned it would make me sound like an older woman from an American sitcom.

In the hallway of the hotel, I remained silent, just over a yard and a half away now, breathing calmly and muscles relaxed. They were in a terrible tactical position, the kid half a step in front of the older guy, central enough that he blocked a physical altercation from immediately being two against one. His position would give me the time to neutralise him before the older figure would even come into play. I was confident in my ability to do so, especially given ASIO officers were expressly forbidden by law to carry a firearm.

‘Mr Tyler,’ the older one spoke, putting a controlling hand on the kid’s shoulder which was very poorly received; the young one attempted to shrug it away and shot a look of pure annoyance at his colleague. It was a tactical error, showing me they were not in sync and probably unused to operating together. ‘We’re from ASIO, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation. We’d like to chat.’

I shrugged and held my palms out, bringing them even closer to the kid, a danger he didn’t recognise. ‘So speak,’ I said quietly, soft enough that the kid leaned forward a little to hear properly which was exactly what I intended, given it put him even closer to my hands. My short verbal response and confident, comfortable demeanour was prompting very different reactions in each of them. The older was suddenly concerned, a frown forming on his face as he watched me closely, as if recognising a threat. The younger was staring at me aggressively.

‘We have a room downstairs. Would you come with us?’ The older officer’s tone was measured, polite.

I nodded, not providing a verbal reply, and stepped aside so they could pass to the elevator. The kid, still eager to assert his authority, reached out for my elbow as if to walk me along the corridor like something he’d seen in a movie. I gave ground and shrugged my arm away from him, brushing against him and emptying the contents of his outside suit pocket at the same time, without his awareness. He bristled but continued to walk down the corridor.

I could feel the leather of his official badge, nicknamed a ‘freddie’, in the palm of my hand, and slipped it into my own pocket.

‘I’m Andrew,’ the older one offered his hand. I gave it a shake, finding his grip gentle and as feminine as his soft hands.

‘Valen,’ I replied, releasing his hand and walking shoulder to shoulder with him down the hall. The kid was holding the elevator door open and only when Andrew and I had stepped in did he offer his own hand.

‘Morgan,’ he practically spat the syllables. I raised an eyebrow and gave his hand a quick shake, a predictably firm grip and a further petty attempt at dominance as he squeezed. This kid had clearly spent more time in an office than operational environment as no amount of his squeezing was going to hurt my hand.

‘Big ‘M’, little ‘organ’?’ I asked, with a perfectly straight face.

Andrew sniggered and we lapsed into silence as the slow elevator took us to the first floor. They both stepped out before me – this entire encounter was full of tactical errors from the agents – and I followed them to a conference room.

What I saw inside made me almost turn to leave immediately. Helen Newton sat at the table. She had the nickname of Giraffe in the organisation and it was for good reason; she had an unnaturally long neck and a body that seemed like it had been stretched out from head to toe. She sat with perfectly composed, ramrod upright posture, her short blonde hair undisturbed by the high flow of air conditioning. An expensive name brand suit, shiny at the shoulders from years of wear, and an elegant looking white shirt. Almost 50 years old, she looked closer to 40 even with limited make-up.

I’d worked alongside ASIO on and off during my years with the government, usually in the places they were too risk averse, cautious or frankly prudent, to send their own.

It was a professional organisation, well-structured and with a good balance between investigative powers and legal restrictions. But, to my mind, it was individuals like Helen who had tarnished the reputation of the 68-year-old agency. She was a schemer, a political chess-player who wielded her power within the agency to make and break careers, only considering her own power base and how to expand it. To bring that mentality to national security issues was repulsive.

‘Valen,’ Helen greeted with a warmth that any stranger would be sure was sincere, presumably using the correct shortened version of my name to build rapport. She seemed poised to stand to greet me when I cut her movement off.

‘What do you want?’ I asked, my transparent hostility freezing her in her approach. I felt the tension in Andrew and the kid behind me.

‘Straight to business, eh?’ she replied, her elongated form stiffened at my less-than-polite words before she slowly sat back down. ‘Sit down, Valen. Would you like a drink?’

I remained where I was, consciously slowing my breathing to relax muscles that were unnaturally and unusually tight. This entire situation was awful for my cover. I released fists I hadn’t realised I’d made. ‘What do you want?’ I repeated. I felt the kid move forward behind me, he was close.

‘Back off, kid. Now.’ My tone dropped and was laced with the menace of someone who wasn’t idly threatening. It was the soft growl of a dog ready to bite, not the loud bark of a dog who had never bitten. Soft words were exchanged behind me and I heard both Andrew and the kid step back.

Helen’s cold, soulless eyes were all too familiar – the warm veneer was gone. ‘WOLF,’ she said simply, watching me with the confidence of someone trained in body language detection. Unfortunately for her, my body language was on mute. ‘Why are you attending tomorrow?’ she asked, finally.

In truth, the question surprised me. The wording was not what I expected. The hackles on the back of my neck raised, something was very wrong with all of this. ‘To find myself,’ I replied, with little emotion.

‘Cut the bullshit routine,’ she snapped, which seemed to surprise even the two figures behind me as I heard them shift uncomfortably. ‘Your presence there jeopardises a national security investigation. I’m ordering you to go back to whatever rock you crawled out from.’ Superiority was a comfortable fit for Helen; she had been a senior figure for much of the last decade and was used to issuing commands that would be immediately and unquestioningly obeyed.

‘Noted,’ I said evenly and turned to leave.

‘Valen,’ she called from behind me. ‘If you show up tomorrow, things are going to get messy for you real fast.’

I stepped away without replying, which brought me back inside proximity with Andrew and the kid.

‘Show some goddamn respect next time, or I’ll teach you some. You couldn’t even imagine how senior she is. If she says to, we will make your life hell,’ the kid sneered.

A headache was starting to form at my left temple, which only exacerbated my increasingly sour mood. I stepped right up to him. He reacted by trying to shove me back, perfectly illustrating the problem with this new generation of ASIO officers – they were never really trained in hand-to-hand combat. Sure, they went through a few weeks of Krav Maga training, but pitting that against someone who had lived with combat for much of his professional life was a poodle facing off against a lion. This situation was a perfect example of where he should have let me leave and found a salve for his ego some other way, but instead escalated a situation that he was in no position to control. Combined with the move itself, putting both hands within my reach for the sole objective of a shove, and he showed his lack of situational awareness and combat readiness.

That rapid reflection on young ASIO officers and the headache was enough for me to let his physical indiscretion pass. I smiled at him, more of a smirk really, and reached into my pocket. The flash of fear on his face was more rewarding than I’d imagined, though at least he finally recognised a potential danger.

I withdrew his ‘freddie’ and flashed it to him. ‘Be careful with your credentials next time, kid,’ I murmured and threw it on the floor a few metres to the side.

He had a choice now, back down and deal with the embarrassment that had already flushed his face a brilliant scarlet, or try to reassert his authority.

‘Morgan,’ Helen snapped, ‘pick it up and let him go.’

The kid stepped aside and did as commanded. I glanced at Andrew who watched with a somewhat bemused expression, as if the entire episode was from a comedy routine. Without words, I held my hand out, palm up. He handed over the room key card with an almost sheepish smile.

I left the conference room and stalked to the stairwell, heading up them two at a time. My immediate instinct was to change hotels. I disliked Helen and her cronies knowing where I was. But given my choice to use my real name and failure to bring along an alternative identity with me, I would either be paying cash somewhere rough, or they could reacquire me anyway. I glanced at my phone on the way back to my room and saw a short message from the hotel head of security, a simple, Ok? . It suggested he had seen me leave the conference room on one of the hotel’s internal security cameras.

My mood remained sour enough to not let him off too lightly. My reply was curt, Next time I want warning. The predictable, Ack came in response.

I shoved open the door to my room, letting it close and securing it with both the lock and latch. I opened my weapons vault, the operating panel not showing the red light that would indicate attempted tampering, and took out the TSCM scanning case. I carried out another exhaustive scan of the room. Nothing. There might be no devices there now, but I wanted to ensure that I could identify anything added without having to scan multiple times a day. So, I headed to the bedroom and retrieved a small container of talcum powder from my toiletries kit.

I flicked my knife blade up and used the point to lift the edge of the flat, overused hotel carpet from where it met the metal join under the front door. Leaving the underlay in place, I sprinkled a healthy layer of powder in a semi-circle around the entrance where a first step would happen.

I carefully replaced the carpet and flicked the switch for the Do Not Disturb light to come on outside my door, removing the chance of a housekeeper confusing my trap. It was a simple trick I had used multiple times while deployed overseas and it gave good indications of the frequency, volume and nature of unwanted visitors to your room.

I had one more low-tech and one high-tech trap to set. I took one of the many handtowels from the bathroom and folded it in half, laying it behind the right side of the bathroom door. When I left tomorrow, I’d drag it against the door before closing it, so if the door were opened, the towel would move. To the untrained eye, it would look like a discarded hand towel, not an intelligence ‘tell’.

I then pulled a small alarm clock from my bag and put it on the bedside table. It looked like it belonged, just another piece of hotel room furniture. But when I left, I’d switch on its second feature, which was a motion-activated video camera concealed within the LED screen. If someone moved in the room, the camera would turn on without light or sound notification and start capturing video of the room that would be available on my mobile, which would send me a notification of its activation.

Back in the lounge room, I took out my cell phone, sending a brief summary of the encounter to Philip via our end-to-end encrypted messaging service.

I went back over Helen’s wording, considering it further. There was uncertainty in her questioning, suggesting it was a genuine question and she didn’t know why I would be attending. It suggested James hadn’t briefed her on my involvement. It was incredibly poor human intelligence – or HUMINT – tradecraft to start with a question you didn’t know the answer to.

National security reasons for me to not attend – that was intriguing and suggested they were independently investigating WOLF. Perhaps they were a Plan B by James in case of my failure.

The thought made me laugh out loud. Knowing James, they were the Plan A and I was the Plan Z. So, now what? My phone vibrated with Philip’s reply, which was characteristically short and gave me a deep frown.

Any means necessary.